LONDON (Reuters) -The British government said on Thursday it was imposing 46 new sanctions on Russia, including on nationals associated with the Wagner mercenary group and on a military officer it accuses of being part of the 2018 Novichok attack in Salisbury.
The foreign ministry said it had added one new designation under the chemical weapons sanctions regime targeting Denis Sergeev, who British police have charged over the murder attempt on former double agent Sergei Skripal.
“Sergeev provided support in the preparation and use of the chemical weapon Novichok in Salisbury…and provided a coordinating role in London on the weekend of the attack,” the government said in a statement.
Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found slumped unconscious on a public bench in the southern English city of Salisbury in March 2018. British authorities say Novichok had been applied to the front door handle of his home.
Police have charged three Russians, who they say are GRU military intelligence officers, in absentia over the incident. Sergeev, who Britain said was acting under the alias Sergey Fedotov, was the last to be charged.
Last month, a public inquiry into the death of a woman who was unwittingly poisoned by the nerve agent heard that Skripal believed Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered the Novichok attack.
Moscow has repeatedly rejected British accusations that it was involved. The Russian embassy in London did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for a comment on the new sanctions.
The British foreign ministry said sanctions had also been imposed on individuals and entities in three African nations – Central African Republic, Libya and Mali – over links to the Wagner group.
Cast as a private army, Wagner enabled Russia to dabble in wars in countries including Syria, Libya and Mali with deniability. Opponents such as the United States consider Wagner to be a crime group which plundered African states.
(Reporting by Muvija M;Writing by Catarina Demony;Editing by Elizabeth Piper and Angus MacSwan)
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